Friday, August 19, 2016

To Fight Zika Beyond Florida We Need Better Sex Education

In light of the recent news that Zika virus could stay in semen for more than six months ― twice as long as scientists previously though the virus could be detected ― it's time for the United States to ramp up its focus on the major mechanism for Zika virus transmission after mosquitos: sex.

“For the public health community, Zika represents an unprecedented emergency,” Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, wrote in the Journal of the American Medical Association in August.

“Never before, to our knowledge, has a mosquito-borne virus been associated with human birth defects or been capable of sexual transmission,” Frieden wrote. “The effects of brain damage due to microcephaly and consequences of other Zika-related birth defects are likely devastating, lifelong, and costly.”

New York City is ramping up its public health messaging on sexually transmitted infections to include Zika virus in coming weeks, The New York Times reports. The campaign will feature posters, fliers, radio and television ads, in addition to deploying community health workers to communicate the risks of sexually transmitted Zika in person.

Florida's sex ed blunder

But not everyone is making public health a priority. In Florida's Broward County, which is adjacent to Miami-Dade County, where active Zika transmissions are occurring, abstinence-only rhetoric is trumping public safety ― at least for now.

According to Miami news station WSVN 7News, Broward County removed two AIDS Healthcare Foundation billboards that featured unrolled condoms reminding people that safe sex “prevents Zika transmissions.”

The Fort Lauderdale mayor's office and tourism board pressured the company to take down the signs, Michael Kahane, a spokesman for the foundation, told the station. “They felt, I guess, that they could impact tourism,” Kahane said. “I find it completely disgusting.”

Still, neither the mayor's office nor the tourism board is taking credit for the sign's removal, so it's unclear who is behind the billboard takedown.

Dr. Federico Laham, the medical director of infectious disease at Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children in Orlando stressed that it's also important for doctors to ask pregnant patients about their travel histories, regardless of whether or not the Aedes aegypti mosquito is present in their areas of practice.

One major challenge for health officials trying to curb sexually transmitted Zika in their respective cities is that it's difficult to craft definitive public health and safe sex recommendations, because no one knows for sure how long Zika virus can stay active ― or remain capable of transmitting infection ― in men's semen.

That information is “very important if you are trying to craft a prevention method to your community,” Laham told The Huffington Post. “Any couple expecting a child will live with a lot of anxiety. It's important for health officials to deliver a clear message.”

Zika isn't the only STI that can hurt unborn babies

For Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, a professor of medicine in the infectious disease and global health divisions at the University of California Los Angeles, focusing on sexually transmitted Zika and the risk it poses to pregnant women misses the point.

“Zika is important, but we need a much broader holistic approach to address infections in pregnant women,” Klausner said.

He cited congenital syphilis ― when a pregnant woman infected with the disease passes it to her child ― as a more common STI, with equally grave consequences. Indeed, congenital syphilis can cause severe illness, miscarriage, stillbirth and early infant death, as well as blindness, nervous system damage and deformity if left untreated.

“When things are common and they occur regularly people forget about them,” Klausner said. “We need to remind people of the day-to-day risks.”